Tributes have been paid to Joan who was famous for her stunts to highlight the plight of animals as well as her work in India where she met Ghandi.

She died in her Sturton Street home on Thursday last week (December 1) “surrounded by her beloved cats” and a wreath laying ceremony will be held by her fellow activists outside Cambridge’s Guildhall on Saturday (December 10) in memory of the campaigner.

Rachel Mathai, spokeswoman for CAP (Cambridge against AstraZeneca Planning) said: “Icon, ‘celebrity’, legend, Joan Court was and always will be a true inspiration to us all. At this event for International Animal Rights Day – a day which was very important to Joan – when we light candles, lay a wreath and hold a minute’s silence for the animals, Joan will be included in recognition of her selfless work for the animals.”

Joan loved her cats

Sue Hughes, spokeswoman for Animal Rights Cambridge said: “December 1 was a sad day for us in Cambridge and for the whole Animal Rights community. Joan died, very peacefully with her beloved cats around her.

“We mourn her passing but what she would most like us to do is get out there and get truly active. She was such a fearless lady – we need to show the world we are still a force to be reckoned with. It’s an end of an era but her mission will carry on and one day the animals will get the rights they deserve. We are lighting candles for Joan, something she always did to guide friends, human and non-human, on their way.”

In honour of International Animal Rights Day, CAP is holding an event which will focus on the tragic plight of the animals destined for the new AstraZeneca animal lab in Cambridge. They will gather outside Cambridge Guildhalll on Saturday from 3-5pm.

Joan had a difficult upbringing, leaving school at 12

Andrew Tyler, an ex-director of Animal Aid and long-standing friend of Joan, paid tribute to her on the campaign group’s website.

He said: “Joan Court’s life as an animal and human rights activist was so extraordinary, so full of colour, daring and accomplishment, that many of us who knew her over the years almost began to think that it was a life that couldn’t be extinguished.

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“But on Thursday, December 1st she died at her Cambridge home surrounded by her beloved, aged cats. She was 97 years old.

“Joan was driven, as you would expect, by a powerful impulse to expose and remedy injustice and cruelty. But that wouldn’t explain the woman she became.

“She told me many years ago that she was a born sensualist, her tastes ran to strong colours, perfumes and ‘exciting action’. It was these qualities, allied to her desire to (let’s be old-fashioned) do good in the world, that set her off on so many extraordinary adventures.

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“Her start was dramatic; her father being a solicitor who committed suicide, and her mother an alcoholic. She left school at the age of 12 but went on to qualify as a social worker helping damaged children, and as a nurse-midwife.

"She took these skills to impoverished regions of Turkey, India and the Appalachian Mountains of Eastern North America.

“In 1946, she was organising midwifery services in the slums of Kolkata, when she got caught up in pre-independence riots and met Mahatma Gandhi. The Indian spiritual leader became the most important influence in her life, although at various times she was also taken by Quakerism, Buddhism and, as she put it, the ‘direct action of Jesus’.

“Animal Aid had a large hand in helping her find her way to animal rights activism. She was given a leaflet, probably by our founder Jean Pink, advertising an anti-vivisection march due to be held in the city. The year was 1978.

“The next day Joan founded a new local group, which was soon undertaking all-night vigils in opposition to the use of animals in laboratory research. She went on to involve herself in every imaginable animal related issue – whether live exports, hunting, shooting, whaling and, of course, the meat and dairy industry. She was, as you would expect and as the Daily Express might put it, a militant vegan.

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“Her speciality was attention grabbing stunts, which were made all the more irresistible to the media because of her age. Her animal campaigning didn’t start until she was nearly 60 but there were frequent banner hangs from high places, public hunger strikes, sit-downs in inconvenient places, and she would make speeches and give interviews in which she refused to apologise for radical direct action or for those who carried them out – although she was opposed to violence.

“Joan would prepare herself for, and then execute the most dramatic actions, quietly and methodically. Equally impressive was the way she allied her cerebral, intellectual qualities to her taste for drama and a love of attention.

“She was someone who would not go quietly. At the age of 85, she joined the Sea Shepherd Flagship, Farley Mowat, on a hunt for illegal fishing vessels in the South Atlantic. Out at sea, she busied herself mending nets, keeping watch and making tea.

“Was she perfect? No, she was not. She could be self-absorbed, cantankerous, bossy and infuriating. But her friends were friends for life. I told her once how much she was respected and she said it wasn’t respect she wanted it was love. I told her she had that too.”